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Thread: Observing Adventure in Australia and completing a milestone

  1. #1
    Member Steve Gottlieb's Avatar
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    Observing Adventure in Australia and completing a milestone

    During the October new moon period I hopped on a 15-hour flight from San Francisco to attend the week-long “Spring" OzSky Star Safari, which took place on the 6300 acre Markdale Homestead, a large working sheep ranch and country estate with a beautiful Heritage garden located 3 1/2 hour drive west of Sydney in the Central Tablelands. A group of Sydney amateurs, in conjunction with the Three River Foundation (3RF) Australia offer this twice-a-year event, with the main star party hosting 3 dozen or so attendees in the Fall (that's around March-April downunder) at Coonabarabran, near the Warrumbungles National Park and the Siding Springs Observatory. It's mostly attended by U.S. amateurs and I'd guess half are repeaters, who are itching for more of the same. What's the draw? If you've been to the southern hemisphere, you know it beats the north, hands down, in terms of open clusters, globular clusters, emission nebulae and the single most impressive external galaxy in the sky -- the Large Magellanic Cloud. And experiencing of viewing the center of the Milky Way at the zenith (with typical skies ~21.8+ SQM) with jet-black dark nebulae forming the Aboriginal "Emu in the sky" is flat-out jaw-dropping.

    The Aussies, led by Lachlan McDonald and Tony Buckley, provide the telescopes -- ranging in size from 18" to 30" (that's me on the ladder of the 30"), equipped with Argo Navis and Servocats if you don't want to star hop in unfamiliar skies, as well as a collection of Televue eyepieces. Really all you need to do to prepare is sign-up in advance, download some of their showpiece observing lists, pack your clothes and join the party! This year only 5 U.S. amateurs signed up and one had to cancel at the last minute. Lachlan brought along 4 large dobsonians -- two 18's, a 25 and a 30", so there was one scope per observer! Lodging was in two cozy stone guest cottages, built in the late 1800's.

    In mid-October, the galaxy-rich constellations of Fornax, Pisces Austrinus, Sculptor, Phoenix and Horologium pass nearly overhead from Australia and eye-candy galaxies in Pavo, Dorado, and Reticulum are well placed. But even in October Sagittarius is better placed than in the U.S, and once you get used to seeing the constellation's Teapot outline completely upside down, its easy to track down obscure globulars and even Sagittarius galaxies that would be difficult from home. But the biggest treat for me is the LMC, as there is absolutely nothing remotely comparable in the northern sky -- as well as the magnificent globular 47 Tucanae, which must be seen to be believed at high power.

    We were pretty fortunate with the weather - 4 straight all-nighters to start the week, then 2 nights of clouds, and a clear 7th night. So, 5 for 7 overall and enough observing time to log about 250 objects. I came prepared with a list of 300 deep sky targets, but a subset of 34 NGCs had a special meaning. These were the only ones I had remaining to observe and record out of the 7840 entries in the 1888 New General Catalogue. I’m not sure if the entire NGC (covering +89 to -89 dec) has been attempted or previously completed by other obsessed amateurs. This huge project been percolating a long time -- I've been slowly working on it (along with many other projects such as Hicksons, Arps, Palomar globulars, Flat galaxies, Abell planetaries, rich galaxy clusters, etc. etc.) for quite awhile -- 37 years to be precise! And along the way, the instruments evolved from a 6" f/5 Edmund, C-8 Schmidt-Cass, 13.1" Odyssey I, 17.5" Sky Designs (early truss-tube dob), 18" f/4.3 Starmaster and 24" f/3.7 Starstructure, along with a little help using Jimi Lowrey's 48-inch .

    Four or five years ago I finished all the NGCs accessible from northern California (down to -40° declination), but there was still over 300 remaining far southern objects. After a couple more trips to Oz that number was whittled down to 34, of which 32 were well placed this time of year (that's why I missed them a year and a half ago from Coonabarabran). The final two would have to be caught low in the sky either at dusk or dawn, but I knew they would be doable. But first a bit of background on the NGC...

    Roughly 2500 deep sky objects in the NGC were discovered by musician-turned-astronomer William Herschel from England and another 1700 by his son John, at Slough, England and later the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. Their discoveries were made with 18.7-inch speculum reflectors -- roughly equivalent in light-grasp to a modern 14- or 15-inch. The next largest contributors in terms of visual discoveries were Albert Marth (over 500 using a 48-inch speculum reflector on the island of Malta), Lewis Swift (over 450 galaxies from Rochester, NY and southern CA using a 16-inch Clark refractor) and Edouard Stephan (over 400 from Marseilles using a 31-inch silver-on-glass reflector). The largest scope that contributed to the NGC was Lord Rosse's 72-inch Leviathan and the discoveries made with this scope go down to mag 16.5V. Within the next few years after the publication of the NGC, the golden era of visual deep sky discovery would wind down as long-exposure photographic plates revealed thousands of dim galaxies beyond visual reach and which now have IC (Index Catalogue) designations.

    During the first two nights I logged 33 of the remaining objects (mostly galaxies in Phoenix and Tucana) using the 25" f/5 Obsession, leaving only one target remaining for the third night -- NGC 2932 -- which is nothing more than a Milky Way star cloud in Vela that captured John Herschel's attention. He called it "an enormous cluster of 1 deg or 1.5 deg, very rich in stars of all magnitudes, from 8m downwards, which merits registry as a sort of telescope Praesape. It may be regarded as a detached portion of the milky way." With so many more mouth-watering targets nearby, most amateurs would probably put NGC 2932 in the "Why bother?" bin. But this one was a little more special to me.

    I tracked down the field after 3:00 AM on the third night using an 18-inch Obsession at 79x (1° field of view). I looked up and noticed Orion was 50° up and of course, turned topsy-turvy on its head! Sirius and Canopus, the two brightest stars in the sky, hovered at 60° altitude and dominated the eastern skies. Truthfully I didn't find the star field of NGC 2932 very exciting, but I carefully examined it and a 1/4 degree richer section caught my eye as appearing more cluster-like. The next day I checked the online SIMBAD database and was pleased to find this collection was catalogued as the 1,694th Milky Way cluster in a 2012 compilation. So perhaps a real cluster is actually embedded in Herschel's star field.

    During the daytime we toured the property, panned for gold, and watched mobs of 'roos bounding across as the fields when we drove by (actually this was a serious road hazard whenever we returned to the estate at twilight) and closely examined some of the other natives (two attached). A bit scary, though, was a visitor who slithered very close to the observing field in the late afternoon -- an Eastern Brown snake, the second most venomous in the world! For some false sense of security, I took all of my notes that night at the shelf on the top of a tall ladder, instead of my usual observing table!

    Australia.1.jpg
    Steve
    24" f/3.7 Starstructure
    18" f/4.3 Starmaster
    Adventures in Deep Space
    Contributing Editor, Sky & Tel

  2. #2
    Member Clear Skies's Avatar
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    Congratulations on this truly epic milestone, Steve!! An accomplishment like no other and a huge and unique contribution to visual astronomy.
    Your report is inspiring; can't wait to get back under dark, southern skies.

    The only question is: what's next? The IC?
    Victor van Wulfen

    clearskies.eu - Clear Skies Observing Guides - CSOG - Blog - Observing Log - Observing Sessions

    SQM is nothing, transparency is everything.

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    Congratulations, Steve! That's an amazing accomplishment. I hope to get there some day.

  4. #4
    Member Howard B's Avatar
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    With much respect, congratulations Steve!
    Howard
    30-inch f/2.7 alt-az Newtonian
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    Contributing Editor, Sky & Telescope magazine

  5. #5
    Member skyraider's Avatar
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    Steve,
    WOW!! This is truly amazing. I am inspired by your accomplishment. I am curious when you say "I tracked down the field"...did you star hop to all of the objects or use go-to?

  6. #6
    Member Steve Gottlieb's Avatar
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    I used the Argo to push-to the general location, but being just a large, undistinguished star field (Brian Skiff noted it as "hardly worth mentioning" through a 6-inch refractor at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile), it took a little while of searching and carefully matching up my pre-printed DSS image to make sure I had identified the correct field.

    John Herschel "discovered" a couple of dozen Milky Way fields (not clusters) that carry NGC designations, but a number of these are a headache to identify as the surrounding rich fields are nearly indistinguishable. I guess you could call these nonexistent (that's what the RNGC did), but they existed -- at least through Herschel's eye!
    Last edited by Steve Gottlieb; November 27th, 2017 at 04:56 PM.
    Steve
    24" f/3.7 Starstructure
    18" f/4.3 Starmaster
    Adventures in Deep Space
    Contributing Editor, Sky & Tel

  7. #7
    Member skyraider's Avatar
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    Steve,
    So somehow your incredible accomplishment of completing the NGC catalog crossed my Facebook page a few weeks ago. I was instantly inspired. For the last year or so I have been (dare I say it) getting almost bored with my observing sessions. As I thought about my astronomy endeavors, and tried to self critique why I was losing interest, it became clear that I needed what I enjoy in all other areas of my life...a new challenge. So I figured I would set a goal to strive for while observing, not just have a session of random observations of random objects. About the same time I came to that conclusion your amazing accomplishment crossed my path. And like I said, I was instantly inspired.
    So...I want to try for all NGC 's visible from my latitude of 40 degrees North.
    If you wouldn't mind, I would love to pick your brain and get some advice.
    How did you start it? How did you keep it organized? Hand written notes or digital log? Did you work on it every observing session or just occasionally? Do you think I should I start with a 'lesser" goal (something like the A.L. Messier list) to get some practice or just dive in to the 7,000+ NGC list? Should I just pick a chart from my favorite atlas, that is positioned well in the sky at that time, and start picking off NGC's from left to right? Compile a spread sheet?
    I'm looking to glean from the knowledge of your experience.
    Any tricks or tips you have would be greatly appreciated.
    Thanks,
    Josh (Skyraider) Wright
    PS. If you feel this question is not keeping in the original context of the thread, feel free to request the moderator move this question to a new or a different thread and answer there

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